Muslim groups have raised tens of thousands of dollars to repair a
Jewish cemetery that was vandalised amid a wave of anti-Semitic threats
sweeping the US.

More than 100 headstones were toppled in the 123-year-old Chesed Shel
Emeth Cemetery in Missouri at the same time some 11 Jewish community
centres received bomb threats across the US. All bomb threats were
determined to be hoaxes.

Now campaigners organised by the Mpower Change and CelebrateMercy
Muslim groups have pledged some $55,000 (£44,000) to repair the
graveyard. Their target was just $20,000, and organisers Linda Sarsour
and Tarek el-Messidi say the rest will go to repair other vandalised
locations.

They wrote on their fundraising page: "While these senseless acts
have filled us with sorrow, we reflect on the message of unity,
tolerance, and mutual protection found in the Constitution of Medina, an
historic social contract between the Medinan Jews and the first Muslim
community."

A regional director of the Anti-Defamation League said she reacted
emotionally when she saw the damaged headstones in University City.

“To see their lives desecrated this way is horrific,” Karen Aroesty
told the St Louis Post-Dispatch. She did not speculate about whether the
damage was caused by a hate-fuelled attack, but she did have suspicions
as to the motivations behind the destruction of the headstones.

The St Louis Rabbinical Association denounced the destruction as
“horrifying and disgraceful acts of vandalism” in a statement released
on Facebook. “Planning is underway for a community clean-up effort,”
they said.

President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi met with representatives from US-based
pro-Israel organizations in Cairo on Sunday, for the fifth time in 20
months.

A delegation from the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations,
which includes several groups supporting the Israeli military and
self-professed Zionist organizations based in the United States, visited
Cairo to discuss a number of issues with President Sisi, according to
statements issued by the presidency that were published in Egyptian
newspapers.

Sisi first met with a number of similar groups in
Cairo in July 2015, followed by meetings in February and December 2016,
and more meetings on the sidelines of the 71st United Nations General Assembly session in September 2016 in New York.

Sunday’s
meeting included discussions on regional developments, including the
situations in Libya and Syria, according to several Egyptian media
outlets, as well as a review of counter-terrorism measures and efforts
to prevent the funding of militant organizations in the region.

The
Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations (AIPAC)
includes the following groups: The American Israeli Public Affairs
Committee (AIPAC), Friends of the Israel Defense Forces (FIDF), the Zionist Organization of America (ZOA), the Association of Reform Zionists of America (ARZA), the Zionist Organization of the Conservative Movement (MERCAZ USA), Religious Zionists of America (RZA) and the American Friends of the Likud (AFLikud).

AIPAC
describes itself as America’s bipartisan lobby to support Israel, while
the FIDF advocates educational and training initiatives for Israeli
military personnel, along with the provision of material assistance for
Israel’s troops, support for Israeli widows and orphans and medical
assistance for wounded members of the Israeli Defense Forces.

The
ZOA describes itself as a group that promotes Jewish identity in Israel
and other occupied Arab territories and helps prepare new generations of
Israeli leaders.

ARZA works to provide material support to its
partner organizations in Israel, along with promoting travel and tourism
to the occupied territories, while MERCAZ USA promotes unity among Jews
worldwide, with Jerusalem as the capital of the “homeland.”

In February 2016, AIPAC issued a statement
after meeting with Sisi that said the two-hour meeting covered a wide
range of domestic and international issues, including Egypt’s relations
with the US and Israel, regional threats, especially those posed by
terrorist organizations and their supporters, and Iran.

“The
Jewish leaders said that they had an open and very productive discussion
and that they were impressed by the President’s analysis on a wide
variety of issues,” the statement added.

In December 2016, Egypt’s
Minister of Defense Sedky Sobhy and Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry
joined Sisi in meeting the American Jewish Committee (AJC). According to a statement
issued by the AJC, they “conferred with President Sisi and senior
Egyptian officials on the importance of strengthening US-Egyptian ties
and the mutual benefits of increasingly close strategic cooperation
between Egypt and Israel.”

CAIRO
— The Egyptian police on Thursday shut down the offices of an
organization that treats victims of torture and violence in the latest
escalation of a harsh government crackdown against human rights defenders and civil liberties groups.

In
justifying the sweeping measures, Egyptian officials say they need to
regulate Western-funded groups that threaten the stability of the
Egyptian state and aid terrorism. Critics say Mr. Sisi is seeking to
consolidate his control by silencing even the mildest sources of
dissent.

Since
coming to power in 2013, his government has locked up tens of thousands
of opponents and effectively outlawed public protests. Now, many fear, President Trump’s support for Mr. Sisi could embolden the Egyptian leader to go further.

Mr. Trump has embraced Mr. Sisi as a “fantastic guy” and invited him to the White House. Mr. Sisi was notably silent about Mr. Trump’s recent ban on travelers from seven predominantly Muslim countries.

Al
Nadeem Center, which was founded in 1993, has been fighting for
survival since last February, when the government first threatened to
close it, citing vague health regulations. The center has provided
therapy to about 1,000 victims of police abuse, its founders say, and
cataloged instances of police torture, unlawful killings and illegal
abductions.

Such abuses have a strong political resonance in Egypt. Public anger at widespread police misconduct was a leading cause of the January 2011 uprising that ousted President Hosni Mubarak.

Early
on Thursday, about 50 police officers turned up at the center’s offices
and put wax seals on the doors, said Magda Adly, a founding member of
Al Nadeem. “I don’t understand how a regime with an army and a police
force can be scared of 20 activists,” she said in a phone interview.

Al
Nadeem had challenged an order to close issued by an administrative
court in Cairo last February. That case is still being heard, so it was
not clear why the police decided to enforce the order on Thursday. In a
statement, Amnesty International said the closing represented “yet
another shocking attack on civil society” by Mr. Sisi’s government.

“The
move exposes the chilling extremes to which the authorities are
prepared to go to in their relentless and unprecedented persecution of
human rights activists,” said Najia Bounaim, Amnesty’s deputy regional
director, at the group’s regional office in Tunis.

Mr. Sisi has struggled to deal with a painful economic crisis
in recent months. Yet he faces little opposition in the news media or
in Parliament, which is filled with his supporters. In recent months
lawmakers drafted a bill that would place further stringent restrictions
on the operation of aid groups in Egypt and that has met with stiff
criticism from Egypt’s Western allies.

Mr. Sisi has not indicated whether he intends to sign the bill into law.

Among
the groups singled out by the government measures is Nazra for Feminist
Studies, which campaigns for gender equality and helps victims of
sexual violence. Along with its founder, Mozn Hassan, it received the
2016 Right Livelihood Award, known to some as the Alternative Nobel Prize.

Since
last year, Nazra’s bank accounts have been frozen, and Ms. Hassan has
been prohibited from leaving Egypt. The group has laid off most of its
50 staff members and has been forced to leave its office. Ms. Hassan
faces criminal charges that carry a potential sentence of life
imprisonment if she is convicted.

“This
is the harshest crackdown on the human rights movement in Egypt since
the 1980s,” Ms. Hassan said. “It’s so clear from the presidential
rhetoric that they do not want us to exist. They want to destroy us.”

Egyptian
prosecutors should drop all charges against at least 26 workers who
were arrested and charged in recent months in connection with peaceful
strikes and protests, Human Rights Watch said today. The parliament
should also revise a new trade unions draft law to fully legalize
independent unions and amend penal code provisions that criminalize the
right to organize and strike.

Since May 2016, police have arrested scores of striking workers from
various industries. Most were later released, but prosecutors have
referred dozens for trial, including some before a military court.
“Arresting workers for striking is another example of how Egyptian
authorities are determined to stifle all space for peaceful
mobilization,” said Joe Stork, deputy Middle East and North Africa director at Human Rights Watch.

In January 2017, prosecutors charged 19 striking workers at an oil
products factory in Suez with inciting a strike and halting production,
though all were acquitted in a trial later that month. In December 2016,
security forces arrested at least 55 striking workers at the Egyptian
Fertilizers Company, and prosecutors summoned eight for investigation.

On September 26, Kamal Abbas, a member of the government-sponsored
National Council for Human Rights and head of the independent Center for
Trade Union and Workers’ Services (CTUWS), wrote to the Interior
Ministry regarding the National Security Agency’s “disappearance” of six workers
from the Public Transport Authority following raids on their homes two
days earlier.

On September 28, following a news conference by families
of the missing workers, the six workers appeared before prosecutors who
accused them of belonging to an unidentified banned group.

In May,
military prosecutors referred 26 Alexandria Shipyard Company workers to a
military court on charges of inciting strikes.

The January strike in Suez followed a sit-in at the privately owned
IFFCO oil products factory in the last week of December seeking an equal
distribution of bonuses between workers and supervisors. The workers
decided to strike after Interior Ministry officers arrested two members of the IFFCO Independent Workers’ Union who had been participating in the sit-in, according to a workers’ statement published in local newspapers.

The CTUWS said that National Security officers demanded that union
leaders end the strike and then police arrested 13 striking workers on
January 2. Prosecutors summoned another 10 for questioning on the same
day and referred 19 to a minor offenses court on charges of inciting a
strike, halting production, and sabotaging factory properties.

Though
the court acquitted the workers, the factory administration can appeal
the decision. Activists told Human Rights Watch that, according to
workers, 26 people were later fired, including the 19 who were
acquitted.

Union leaders at the IFFCO factory demanded a larger share of bonuses
after the prices of everyday goods in Egypt rose dramatically when the
government floated the Egyptian pound in early November, a requirement
for a US$12 billion International Monetary Fund (IMF) loan package.
Since then, the pound has lost more than 100 percent of its value, and
the IMF has estimated that inflation will rise to 18 percent.

Egyptian authorities greatly restrict the ability of workers to
mobilize independently, and the penal code criminalizes strikes and
workplace sit-ins in articles 124 and 125, with sentences of up to two
years, despite several administrative court rulings that have upheld the
right to strike.

Kamal Abbas, the CTUWS leader, told Human Rights Watch that the
government-controlled Egyptian Trade Union Federation (ETUF) sent a
letter to the administration of the Suez oil products factory saying
that the independent workers’ union, which had signed two collective
bargaining agreements with administrators in 2012 and 2015, was illegal.
The IFFCO Independent Workers’ Union could be shut down as a result.

The government has never legalized the independent labor unions that
proliferated after the 2011 uprising, while officially recognized
unions have not held elections for 11 years, and successive governments
have appointed union leaders, most recently in January.

In June, an administrative court sent the current, restrictive 1976
law on unions for review, stating that “the [ETUF] was not capable of
expressing workers’ grievances and hopes whether before the state or
business owners.” To Human Rights Watch’s knowledge, the Supreme
Constitutional Court has yet to take up the case.

In April 2016, Human Rights Watch called on the Egyptian authorities to legalize independent unions
and criticized a draft law that would dissolve independent unions and
restrict workers’ rights. The cabinet approved a modified draft in July
and sent it to parliament
on January 25. The current draft would not recognize existing
independent unions and would impose prison sentences for establishing
unions that do not follow the new law.

The sharp devaluation of the Egyptian pound also led to strikes in
November and December at two privately owned fertilizer companies in the
Suez governorate, Egyptian Fertilizers Company and the Egyptian Basic
Industries Corporation, the independent news website Mada Masr reported.

Police dawn raids ended both sit-ins, and police rounded up at least 55
workers, one worker participating in the sit-in told Human Rights
Watch. Central Security Force riot police put the arrested workers
inside vans and dropped them in a deserted area three hours later, the
worker said.

A representative for the Egyptian Fertilizers Company told Human
Rights Watch that police tried for 10 days to convince workers occupying
control rooms to leave before “very peacefully” ending the sit-in.

The
workers returned to work the following morning. He said that halting
production was a crime and acknowledged that prosecutors summoned
several workers, but said the administration had not made complaints
against them during the investigations. Workers denied the
administration’s allegations that they stopped the production or
occupied the control room.

Dawn raids also led to the arrest of six Public Transport Authority
workers from their homes in Cairo on September 24, ahead of a planned
strike demanding bonuses. Authorities did not acknowledge their
whereabouts for four days, CTUWS leader Kamal Abbas told Human Rights
Watch, adding that lawyers had not been allowed to obtain a copy of
prosecution documents as required by law.

Prosecutors accused the six of
joining a banned group that prosecutors did not identify, inciting
strikes, and disturbing public order, pro-government news websites
reported. Two of the workers remain in pretrial detention, while
authorities released four pending investigation.

Egypt’s military has also suppressed workers’ actions. In
Alexandria, 26 workers of the military-owned Alexandria Shipyard Company
have been on trial before a military court since June 21, 2016. A report by the Egyptian Center for Economic and Social Rights
(ECESR) said the workers had organized a brief protest inside the
company’s premises on May 23 and 24, to demand bonuses, promotions, and
safety equipment and tried to negotiate with General Abd al-Hamid
Essmat, the company’s executive.

On May 25, military prosecutors ordered 13 workers held pending
investigation. One, a woman, was released on bail. Thirteen others were
arrested weeks later. Fatma Ramadan, the head of an independent union
and a workers’ rights researcher, told Human Rights Watch that military prosecutors relied entirely on a memo from the company
to charge the workers with inciting strikes and abstaining from work.
Human Rights Watch was not able to review the memo. After several days,
the company allowed 1,100 of 2,800 workers to return, the ECESR said.

The shipyard administration told workers they would be released if
they resigned, said Abbas and an ECESR lawyer. All the prosecuted
workers resigned and were released on bail in groups in October, November, and December, but they still face trial.

Military prosecutors referred the striking workers to military court
under the Military Code of Justice, which covers civilian workers in
military-owned institutions and does not establish any workers’ rights.
The current draft unions law would not change this.

Egypt’s constitution grants freedom of association and the right to
strike. Egypt is a state party to the International Covenant on
Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, article 8 of which establishes the right to strike,
as well as the right to form and join trade unions and national and
international confederations. Egypt is also a member of the
International Labour Organization and has ratified its eight fundamental conventions.

Parliament should ensure that the draft union law under
consideration meets Egypt’s obligations under international human rights
law by allowing free and fair union elections and ensuring
straightforward legalization procedures for all existing independent
unions. Civilian workers in military institutions should be allowed
association rights and should never be tried before military courts.

Human Rights Watch wrote to IFFCO, the Public Transport Authority,
and the Alexandria Shipyard Company, regarding the incidents but
received no responses.

“Instead of arresting and prosecuting workers, the government should
amend its laws to guarantee workers’ rights to effective bargaining and
mobilization which are essential to effective economic reform,” Stork
said.

More than 2,000 workers at the Misr Spinning and Weaving Company in
the Nile Delta City of Mahalla initiated a partial strike on Tuesday,
and warned of a comprehensive strike starting on Wednesday which could
potentially involve all of the company’s factories and nearly 17,000
workers.

The strike has affected five factories within the
state-owned company, accounting for approximately one fifth of its
productive capacity. Workers at the company, which is Egypt’s largest
textile mill, are demanding the payment of overdue bonuses and
augmented food allowances in light of increasing inflation rates and the recent implementation of austerity measures.

They
announced that they will launch a comprehensive strike across all of
the company’s Mahalla factories within two days if their demands are not
met.

One of the striking workers, who wished to remain anonymous,
told Mada Masr that the strike began in a factory manufacturing bed
sheets, which is primarily operated by female workers.

They said,
“We are all demanding that our incomes be augmented in line with the
constantly rising cost of living, and that our basic wages be increased
so that we are able to cope with the new austerity policies.”

Despite being a state-owned company, Misr Spinning and Weaving Company workers are not granted the national monthly minimum wage of LE1,200 allocated to public sector employees.

On
average, their total wages range between LE900 per month for recently
employed workers, to approximately LE3,000 for the most senior manual
workers.

“Even this monthly minimum wage is insufficient to
provide for workers and their families these days. A minimum basic
monthly wage of LE1,500, in addition to bonuses, would be a good
starting point so that workers can make ends meet” the worker lamented.

The strikers are demanding the payment of an overdue 10 percent annual “social bonus,” authorized by the Finance Ministry in 2015, calculated based on a workers basic wage.

They
are also lobbying for their daily food allowance to be increased from
LE7 to LE10, and for monthly bonuses of LE220 to be included in basic
wage calculations, rather than being issued separately as a bonus
payment. The worker said that those on strike believe this is in keeping
with rising prices, proposing a higher allowance of LE20.

Other
demands raised include the re-operation of several stalled factories and
production lines within the company, the reinstatement of punitively
sacked workers and the recall of the local trade union committee.

The
company’s employees have been attempting to recall the union committee
and replace it with an independent union since December 2006.

According
to the textile worker, “This union doesn’t represent us. It represents
the company’s management. It always aligns itself with the management’s
policies, and always follows the stances adopted by the Textile Holding
Company.”

The independent Center for Trade Union and Workers’ Services issued a statement on Tuesday calling on security forces not to take punitive actions against Mahalla’s textile workers for exercising their constitutional right to strike, stipulated in Constitutional Article 15. In recent months strikes at several other companies have been met with a security crackdown.

Cairo — Egyptian security forces arrested dozens in central
Cairo on Wednesday, the anniversary of a soccer riot that killed over 70
fans in 2012.

Lawyer Mokhtar Mounir told The Associated Press that over 80
people were taken into custody, with some arrests made near the club
grounds belonging to the Al-Ahly team.

Most of the victims of the rioting five years ago were fans
of Al-Ahly. The rioting was Egypt's worst soccer disaster to date and
one of the world's deadliest.

The lawyer said the police likely made the arrests Wednesday
on suspicion those detained had planned to stage a protest. Public
gatherings without a permit are banned under Egypt's draconian
anti-terrorism laws.

Mounir said the detainees were undergoing security checks
and officials would determine whether to release them or press charges.
In 2015, a court declared Al-Ahly's hardcore "Ultras Ahlawy" fan group a
terrorist organization.

The arrests came as Egyptians gathered in cafes all over the
country to watch the national team play Burkina Faso in the first
semifinals match of the African championship in Gabon. At least a dozen
police and security forces' vehicles as well as armed troops were
stationed near the Al-Ahly club grounds in the evening Wednesday.

In 2015, an Egyptian criminal court in the Mediterranean
city of Port Said sentenced 11 people to death over the riot. No
officials or security personnel were among the convicted. A court is set
to review the appeals of the convicted later this month.